‘Cautionary Tale’ Triggers Heated Responses About Digital Modeling
Reader comments are still coming online about “A Cautionary Tale of Virtual Design and Construction: Insurance settlement related to a building information model shows that BIM without communication can be costly” by Nadine M. Post. The piece, published in the May 23 print ENR issue (p. 10) and on ENR.com, describes a dispute that was settled privately involving the design and construction team for a life-sciences building. The job ran into trouble when the contractor could not fit the MEP systems—designed using BIM—into the ceiling plenum. The source about the claim, an XL Insurance vice president, would not name the project or the parties in the dispute. Here is an edited sampling of the anonymous responses:
• It sounded as though the contractor didn’t participate in the BIM process. If the model was fully coordinated and was supplied to the contractor for reference, the contractor could have used 4D sequencing tools to examine the various work flows and discover this issue in the virtual realm. If the virtual model fits and “works,” then it’s the contractor’s responsibility to reproduce this.